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After a week-long hearing held in September, the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board (PLRB) has ruled that Penn State’s graduate assistants have union rights under the Pennsylvania Employee Relations Act.

“We’re ecstatic that the PLRB has ordered an election,” Katie Warczak, the media officer for the Coalition of Graduate Employees, said in a press release. “We’re looking forward to exercising our right to vote, and we’re confident that it’s a vote we’ll win.”

No union election date has been set.

The Coalition of Graduate Employees (CGE) first filed for union representation in February 2017 after launching two years earlier. Citing a need to “improve working conditions” with an increased reliance on graduate students as instructors, CGE hoped to join students at more than 30 other universities with graduate employee unions in the United States.

The university stated its opposition to graduate student unionization with President Eric Barron releasing a letter stating “the university’s relationship with our students is fundamentally different from that of an employer and employee.”

“Penn State will continue to follow the PLRB process, however, we are disappointed by the decision and are evaluating all our options going forward,” the university wrote in a statement. “The hearing examiner in this case has ordered that the following groups of graduate students will be eligible to vote: all graduate students on graduate assistantships or traineeships. Penn State will prepare a list of eligible voters who are in these groups based on their appointments for the Spring 2018 semester.”

“It is important to note that results of any election will be determined by the majority of those who vote, not by the majority of graduate students. Penn State encourages all eligible students to vote and make their voices heard when the election occurs.”

CGE stated when it filed for unionization that it hoped the university would stick to “remaining neutral” during the unionization process. The university did not immediately respond to a request regarding how much it spend to contract Ballard Spahr, the firm which represented the university in hearings with the PLRB.

“Penn State’s administrators spent hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to deny us this vote,” CGE Co-President Jerome Clarke said in a release. “Ultimately, it didn’t matter. We are workers and today the PLRB affirmed that status.”

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About the Author

Steve Connelly is a senior majoring in PR and an editor for Onward State. He is a proud native of the state of New Jersey, and yes, he is literal trash. He is a soccer fan, nap enthusiast, and chicken tender connoisseur. He tries to be a photographer sometimes despite one of his photos inspiring the name of his future sports bar, the Blurry Zamboni. You can follow him on Twitter @slc2o (feel free to slide), email him at [email protected], or come say hi to him in his office, the Irving's basement.

“No one is above the law, and my office will continue to pursue anyone who looks the other way in the face of child sexual abuse. There are consequences for failing to protect children in Pennsylvania,” Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro said.